Archive for June, 2004

Sob sob England out of Euro 2004… gutted. I really thought this could have been our year, but it wasn’t to be. The Ref was a disgrace. . . Bet he’s got a holiday home on the Algarve out of it. He must have been bribed to keep the hosts in the competition, so much for swiss neutrality.

So there I was, bright and early on Saturday morning, camera in one hand, tripod in the other, bag full of film on my back.. I was going on a shoot again.

The project is basically taking two of my favourite things, food and photography, and putting them together. So, I started banging off film in the first venue, then about an hour later, moved on to the second place, then disaster… My EOS 1000 started to act up, the AF lens was shuddering a lot and the shutter kept jamming open.. PANIC!!!

The Battery light is flashing at this point, so I leg it up the road to Jessops (Clapham Junction Chapter) and bless ’em, they opened a new battery for me to try. When the problem kept happening with the new battery, I knew the camera was duff. I was tempted there and then to put down £800 and buy a EOS 300D, it was like the Gods where willing me to move on to a proper digital SLR, but then Mr Mortgage Man kneed the Gods in the nuts and reminded me I’m trying to buy a house. Bugger, the first decent shoot I get together and it’s stalled, and a plan formed…

Months ago I’d lent my old SLR, a simple Nikon FG-20 to a mate who was doing a beginners photography course, hmmm, I called her and she drove the camera round. Re-tooled up, I set out again for the third venue, and you know what? It was great working with my old manual SLR again. Initially I kept forgetting to wind the film on, and found the lack of zoom from the fixed 50mm lens a bit odd at first. But like Capa said, ‘if you’re pictures aren’t good enough, you’re not close enough’.

I return home around four, tired and happy. Though the ol’ head was thumping due to a day spent squinting through the view finder. Must sort out that eye test next week.

Spent yesterday evening within the company of the excellent Bill Bailey. And a very funny man he is too. Highlights included, Easternders, a bangera version of the classic soap theme tune; ‘cousin in red’, a banjo version of the Chris de Burg’s number One, (de Burg featured strongly as a figure of hate) but my particular fave was the techno remix of the News 24 theme. That and the zippery de doo dar song done in the style of Portishead, ahh trip hop, so fondly missed. The DVD is coming out in November, and I’ll think I’ll buy it.